Who's Saving the Planet?

This week we're revisiting one of our favorite stories from 2020, the crazy duo in South Africa building engines that look like beetles powered by plastic from oceans. We're working on a whole slate of new, wonderful, inspiring stories for you in 2021, thanks fall the laughs (and fish) and see you next year! ----------------------------------------- A mechanical bug just might be the answer to solving the world's plastic problem — a 6 billion-ton problem. That's how much plastic is in the environment. It piles up onto our land into trash heaps, and clogs our oceans, forming islands. It's beyond gross. "The question still remains," Scarab Tech co-founder Simon Davis tells us. "What on Earth do we do with this ever growing mountain of plastic?" Simon and his fellow co-founder, Jeffrey Barbee, have an answer. These beetle bros educate Lex and Tony on the technological advancements they made by "feeding" their mechanical creation excess trash, which is then transformed into fuel that can power electrical grids. So not only is this "Dung Beetle" gobbling up our garbage, it also has the ability to solve an extremely important issue: energy poverty. Impoverished communities either rely on archaic solutions like coal, or have zero energy resources at all. Meanwhile, plastic continues to pollute local water resources. Can a fire-belching beetle come to the rescue? Sounds like science fiction, but it's not — this "scarab" solution can solve a very real, and devastating, crisis.

In 2009 Dr. Harvey Karp was in the twilight of his career as a renowned pediatric physician, beloved professor of medicine, and renowned author of the "Happiest Baby"  book series. While he was working the speaking circuit, lecturing on his Five S's infant calming technique, it occurred to him that the methods he espoused to calm babies (and restore a sense of confidence to parents) could be applied to a machine, a bassinet perhaps.  A handful of cocktail napkins worth of sketches later, he found he'd just embarked on his second career as an entrepreneur.  In this episode of WSTP we dig into Dr. Karp's experience transitioning from what he describes as a risk-averse lifestyle into the world of venture-backed start-ups, the progress from the moment of inspiration to the grind of building a physical product, and what inspires him to continue working to improve the lives of parents and health of babies the world over. 

Steve Sakala says there's zero excuse for consumer packaged goods companies to not be plastic negative. Take his work in the cannabis industry, for example. Like most industries, the world of weed has a major sustainability problem. It creates (at least) 150 million tons of waste annually, mainly due to single-use plastic packaging. Steve was with the Peace Corp, traveled the world, learned a lot, settled down in Hawaii and launched Mana Artisan Botanics — which he claims is the first plastic-negative CBD company in the U.S. How did he do it? Well, it's simple. He partnered with rePurpose Global, a one-stop shop that collects and recycles one pound of ocean-bound plastic waste for every product Steve sells. They also ditch plastic packaging, use sustainable alternatives, support regenerative and local farming practices and source ingredients locally to reduce the carbon footprint. Join us in saying "Aloha" to Steve!

Do you have a drawer or box filled with old laptops and smartphones? Or  perhaps your electric vehicle is reaching the end of its life and you're  shopping for a new one? What happens to the lithium batteries powering  each of these machines? Ajay Kochhar has an answer. He and fellow  battery expert Tim Johnston launched Li-Cyle — a startup devoted to  recover critical materials from lithium-ion batteries and reintroducing  them back into the supply chain. That way, they're not just sitting  around in landfills — or worse — seeping materials into the earth. Also,  they're reducing the need for mining, which takes a devastating toll on  human lives. Tune in to learn how University of Toronto alum Ajay  wields his clean tech company to not only solve the global battery  problem, but recycle those important battery ingredients back to the  manufacturers that need them. And discover what you can do to help!

At the top of this episode, special guest Penelope Barr reminds us: Getting up and living your life well makes you the hero of your story. She's certainly done that. With 20-plus years of tech expertise, Penelope is leading the way to a more eco-friendly world on a local and global level in a very unique way — a video game. Carbon0 is an interactive augmented reality game that takes a positive approach to literally helping save the planet. Let's face it: Doing the wrong thing is easy, she tells us. And figuring out the best way to approach a problem can be really confusing. But once you figure it out, like any puzzle, it's rewarding. So Carbon0 offers a carbon-footprint calculator that allows you and your avatar to undertake daily missions centering around recycling, transit, utilities, diet, etc. — all to earn points on the "Everyday Hero Leaderboard." Players can also plant trees and use AR to visualize what could be possible. The game launched at the San Francisco Science Hackathon where Penelope and her team won the Design prize. It went on to win the Climathon Hackathon; a cash prize from Square; was selected into the Global Climate Hack; secured a $10k in-kind prize from Google; and was selected as one of the top 10 ideas from all of the global Climathons to attend the ChangeNow bootcamp in Paris earlier this year. Jess Miles joins Tony and Lex for all the video-game geeky goodness. Tune in!

On Black Friday, ditch the guilt and secure your stocking stuffers with an episode that honors the environment and Indigenous peoples. As anyone knows, makeup is a deeply personal endeavor. How we see ourselves, matters. The story of where our makeup comes from should matter too. Big makeup companies try to engineer representation and empowerment, using glitzy television ads with trendy pop songs and social media campaigns with catchy slogans. But consumers know authenticity when they see it. Cheekbone Beauty is an Indigenous-owned and founded, digitally native, Canadian cosmetics company established in 2016 by Jennifer Harper. Cheekbone Beauty creates high quality, cruelty-free beauty products such as liquid lipsticks and complexion products including contour and highlight palettes. More importantly, Cheekbone Beauty helps Indigenous youth feel represented and seen in the beauty community. Jenn’s story, however, is about so much more than makeup. I connected with Jenn’s story on a personal level. I can relate to Jenn’s struggle with her Native roots as well as coming to terms with the generational trauma caused by having a relative go through the Indian residential school system. How we see ourselves reflected in society matters. Growing up, all I wanted was someone like Jenn, who could relate to what I was feeling, could show me that it was OK to be myself, and could be a role model for success as a professional. Jenn’s connection to her Native identity is the driving force behind her commitment to making a sustainable product in an industry that is notoriously unsustainable. — Jessica Miles

Gina Stovell has been called many things: climate scientists, onetime geological consultant, sustainability evangelists (that's me who called her that, not a title she'd give herself), entrepreneur, and, most recently, pioneer of the resurgence of flow fashion.  Delivery times for her clothing company Two Days Off vary depending on how long it takes to make the garment you order, a concept directly opposed to today's culture of instant gratification and promises of same day delivery. Each article is made to order from deadstock fabric that has already been constructed but left unused. According to their site, "this means the lead time for made-to-order garments is at least 4 weeks.During that time we cut, sew, and finish each garment with a close eye for detail and quality. For our small-batch runs, pieces are often limited edition, meaning just you and a few others will own it."  Gina  embraces the philosophy that doing things the right way is worth the wait, and sometimes efficiency can be more harmful than it is useful. 

Here's a question I get often. How many trees can a tree planter plant, if a tree planter could plant trees all day? The answer: Many fewer than if the tree planter was a squadron of drones flying in formation precision dropping seed pellets to micro-sites. SATs were my favorite.  We have an issue here on earth: we're burning forests faster than they can naturally regenerate. Grant Canary is here to do something about that, and he's brought reinforcements. DroneSeed was founded to solve the inefficiencies wrought in traditional re-forestation techniques, chief among them, it takes way too long. He's leading the effort to, as he put it, become the "opening pitcher" for carbon sequestration efforts through the marriage of cutting edge technology with generations old forestry knowledge.  Come for the drones, stay for the planetary salvation.

Happy Democracy Day in the United States! There's no one we'd rather have on the pod today to help us make sense of the marriage between climate and policy than our guest, Jason Bordoff. Jason founded the Center for Global Energy Policy at Columbia University after a tenure as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Energy and Climate Change on the Staff of the National Security Council, and, prior to that, holding senior policy positions on the White House's National Economic Council and Council on Environmental Quality. So yeah, he's the guy who can help us make sense of the kaleidoscope that is contemporary climate politics.  How will government support innovation in the start up community. What policy has the best chance of fostering the change in energy policy we need in order to stay below the 1.5 degrees threshold? How will a new administration allocate the political capital it needs to get that ambitious policy agenda through congress, and if it does, what will happen when it's tested by a staunchly conservative judicial Supreme Court?   After we cover those light topics, we turn to a vision for the future. What does a sustainable world look like, and how will government help us get there? Immensely grateful to Jason for joining us on this most consequential of days. And if you haven't gotten enough, check out his Podcast, Columbia Energy Exchange!

Have you ever fed a plastic bottle into the machine outside the grocery store, watched in amazement as it disappeared into that mysterious maw and returned to you a nickel, and left thinking you did your part to reduce, reuse and recycle?  Ever wondered what happened to that bottle? Today, we explore the dirty and woefully inefficient side of plastic recycling.  Martin Stephan, Deputy CEO of Carbios, leads us on a journey of understanding the current state of plastic recycling, how little progression in technology has taken place in the proceeding three decades, and what Carbios is doing to revolutionize the industry.  Without giving away the (disposable) bag, the team at Carbios have devised a means of utilizing enzymes to chemically break down plastic into its prime molecular components so it can be re-assembled with near perfect efficiency. What that means effectively? In a future coming toward you, we may never need to make a new  bottle out of virgin plastic again.